[CAVO] FW: [VVSG-interoperability] [VVSG-election] Single Point of Failure - the Scan Head - RE: By November, Russian hackers could target voting machines

Sun Jul 31 14:50:51 UTC 2016

From: Brent Turner [mailto:turnerbrentm at gmail.com] 
Sent: Sunday, July 31, 2016 12:16 AM
To: Gregory Miller <gmiller at osetfoundation.org>; Tim Mayer <timbmayer at gmail.com>; Alan Dechert <dechert at gmail.com>; Brigette Hunley <brigette.hunley at gmail.com>; Alec Bash <alec.bash at gmail.com>; Lawrence Rosen <lrosen at rosenlaw.com>
Subject: Re: [VVSG-interoperability] [VVSG-election] Single Point of Failure - the Scan Head - RE: By November, Russian hackers could target voting machines

I have no time or interest in dissolving CAVO.  My father taught me long ago, "Never try to shoot a man attempting suicide."  

Why do you think CAVO's mission to educate and provide GPL open source voting is a suicide mission ?  

Billionaires are not seeking control.  They are interested in making high impact social investments that are donations; legal gifts for income tax purposes to affect some social good.  In fact, by virtue of their grants and gifts under IRS law they canNOT have ANY control in how the money is used only that it is used for the purpose of the mission of the receiving organization, who in turn, cannot use it for anything other than its nonprofit purpose.  And it all must be clearly documented.

Do you really think I meant control of the expenditures ?  Or do you think I meant control of the outcome of elections  ? 

And they (no one in fact) ever "demanded" anything.  We offered them a solution to their objections (some six reasons they raised) why the GPL was insufficient.  We built a solution to remove those objections.  They did not demand it.    

Who is " they "  ? 

They only pointed out that for the reasons now we;; stated, they could not accept the GPL without requiring modifications to it as part of any contract to purchase any system from any vendor who might incorporate open source software subject to a weak copyleft license.

Explain this to me 

On Sat, Jul 30, 2016 at 7:51 PM, Brent Turner <turnerbrentm at gmail.com <mailto:turnerbrentm at gmail.com> > wrote:

Your ad-hominem attacks are very sad.  "lack thereof" ...really? Kiniry knows more and has done more in this arena of election technology and integrity than you ever can or will.  And I am certain that nobody gives a damn what you're impressed by.  Your words and behavior are ensuring that at some point you will be completely irrelevant because as it stands now, you are actually hurting the importance and value of publicly owned transparent voting infrastructure to election integrity and the preservation of democracy.

Lighten up, Greg..   Did you really think you could get away with gaming the election reform movement ?  I'm just the communications guy-- don't kill the messenger.  The entire community knows you and your boys are full of fabrication and deceit . That's not my fault.  We asked you to align with the power of light but you declined.  For the record-- -  <http://openvoting.org/ad/gao-p51.pdf> http://openvoting.org/ad/gao-p51.pdf    Where were you ?  i know all about Dill... 'OS is no panacea " ..  yeah .. noone said it was.. 

 Oracle has no interest in the elections technology world. None. Zero.  And this ridiculous misinformed ignorant conspiracy theory junk such as "his associates work for Microsoft..." again makes you look like a dolt. Oracle and Microsoft are no friends.  Microsoft has no announced effort in the crappy market and industry that is elections.  They don't have to; their Windows platform sadly remains one the most prevalent computing software in government.

Politics make strange bedfellows--  and certainly Microsoft is the opponent toopen source.. along with their allies.. This is elementary so your feigning ignorance is not helpful.  The genie is way out of the bottle. We know who you are, Greg. Retain some dignity and stop with the name calling. changes nothing.  

You came into this game on others coattails and never reached out to the OS community--  Those around Richard Stallman ..like Brian Fox and other CAVO  members are THE REAL community.  Not fakers or billionaire shills..  The REAL ONES.  Not your cartoon version.  Get that straight. You can not change the history of OS with your money or will power. 

Your rant time is over. We will defeat you and any others attempting to compromise election / national security with your schemes.  There is more I'm not telling you. I would not want to be in your position.  tell your billionaires and their lawyers to call me.. we'll chat further  

On Sat, Jul 30, 2016 at 7:16 PM, Gregory Miller <gmiller at osetfoundation.org <mailto:gmiller at osetfoundation.org> > wrote:

Brent-

I'll respond to this one message, but then intend to dismiss further communication as it is difficult if not impossible to have any kind of an intellectually honest communication with someone who merchants in their own facts.  It is sad that you cannot even step back and see what kind of a dolt you are making yourself out to be.  Do you actually think that any of the individuals whom you believe you are influencing are ultimately doing anything but being polite?

To one last time attempt to offer some clarity here are some factual responses, although I seriously doubt you will actually read or be open to consider any data other than your own distorted sense of reality.  Beyond this, if you insist on persisting with your missives of distorted fact and personal attack, I can simply redirect you to our Legal Department.  

These messages such as the one I respond to below (in blue) have killed any consideration of or incentive to work with you or your group in any capacity.  And once you went personal, any such consideration was definitely finished.

On Sat, Jul 30, 2016 at 3:35 PM, Brent Turner <turnerbrentm at gmail.com <mailto:turnerbrentm at gmail.com> > wrote:

I said I don't know him --personally -  I am familiar with his work.. or lack thereof - in the community.. We are not afraid of nor impressed by Dill or Kiniry --  next-- 

Your ad-hominem attacks are very sad.  "lack thereof" ...really? Kiniry knows more and has done more in this arena of election technology and integrity than you ever can or will.  And I am certain that nobody gives a damn what you're impressed by.  Your words and behavior are ensuring that at some point you will be completely irrelevant because as it stands now, you are actually hurting the importance and value of publicly owned transparent voting infrastructure to election integrity and the preservation of democracy.

and ? 

And the point was that the person you were so dismissive of as "having no clue to what was going on in S.F." was at the same Hearing you were citing. 

3. A resolution of the S.F. government created the S.F. Task Force, for which I was selected as a seated member, holding one of the two positions representing computer science; Dr. Ka Ping Yee was the other.  No single individual created the Voting Systems Task Force (And could not legally do so), although several had pushed for it with the City

..  -  Check the record to see my effort ( with Alan Dechert ) to block SF' 's voting system purchase--  At that time John Arnst promised the creation of the task force  but did not implement.  It is known I was the catalyst for it's creation by my advocacy that was embraced by Supes Ammiano and Daly-   next  

That's your interpretation of the record, and similar to Donald Trump because you are so consumed with desperately needing validation and attention to yourself, all you can see is that you, and only you were responsible for something.  This is another example of using your own set of facts.  While you may have been a catalyst you most certainly were not the only one. I was not approached by you regarding the SF Task Force; our legal counsel was approached by other activists who sought our input and ultimately saw to my nomination.  When we were briefed by the Mayor's office on the Task Force, the history of what transpired involves many more than just you, Brent.  A Resolution by the City government created that task force, not you. And everyone else knows that, so you continue to look like a dolt with silly irrelevant claims.  This is a group effort by more citizens than just you.

 including folks like Roger Donaldson, long time SF activist and Oracle executive, who deserves a bunch of credit for navigating the politics to do so.

Roger Donaldson did nothing and this  is a prime example of my point.  We are opponents. He works for Oracle and his associates work for Microsoft. next- 

Well, that's pure Brent churned B.S.  Roger Donaldson, a resident of S.F. has a long record of city activism and he is one of the individuals who approached several Silicon Valley open source advocates about the formation of the Task Force.  He is on the Election Commission now, and if he is your opponent then that seems to be bad news for your agenda.  

And his employment by Oracle is irrelevant.  Oracle has no interest in the elections technology world. None. Zero.  And this ridiculous misinformed ignorant conspiracy theory junk such as "his associates work for Microsoft..." again makes you look like a dolt. Oracle and Microsoft are no friends.  Microsoft has no announced effort in the crappy market and industry that is elections.  They don't have to; their Windows platform sadly remains one the most prevalent computing software in government.

4. The Voting Systems Task Force had absolutely nothing to do with any kind of open source development effort, licenses aside.  The Report did discuss the potential of OSS.

The task force concluded the best method was open source. Though you fought for disclosed code..  you lost 

But you were including that comment in your statements about DEVELOPMENT (i.e., building of software).  This is lunatic bull shit, Brent.  Read the damn report yourself, you dolt.  I fought for nothing but transparency and with intellectual honesty and avoiding looking as though I was biased. I along with others observed that there were a number of ways to achieve transparency.  The Report was voted on for acceptance.  I lost nothing.  I performed my duties and a large amount of volunteer work went into it.  I was part of the Task Force. We voted with a majority consensus to accept what WE drafted.  Its in the report:

Mandate 3 of the Final Report posits several forms of transparency and states:
Open System Design
·       Preference for open source or disclosed software / source code, hardware designs, and firmware

All of us preferred an open source approach, but as an employee of a research nonprofit working on OSS approaches, I had to be careful what I said.  The TEAM VOTED on that sentence as the best and most credible way to state it.  Come on Brent, baseless charges that are ignorant of the facts kills any credibility you might have..

5. I could be mistaken, but I do not believe NH Election Director Anthony Stevens is prepared to say NH has "adopted" for production anything for public elections but is in pilot, evaluation, and testing of several technologies, the Prime III included. One should not get ahead of their skis on that. 

It is my understanding half of the Prime 3 system ( the front end )  is in use. Anthony is an extreme OS and CAVO advocate. Anthony  publicly thanks CAVO for our groundbreaking efforts- next- 

Again you are deluded. And for political sake, no one is going to say anything negative in public, not that Anthony has anything negative to say.  But I have known Anthony Stevens far longer than you have.  I guarantee it.  He is an advocate for whatever will get his job done cost effectively.  CAVO advocate?  You believe that, don't you?  "Extreme" OSS advocate? No. "Extreme" is  not an accurate characterization, but I get that accuracy is of no concern to you.  Prime III (portions thereof) are in limited use.  You are not privy to all the discussions or comments in the election integrity community.

6. It is also incredibly difficult to believe that the EAC's Bryan Newby could be on anyone's Board or serve as an Advisor thereof of any organization within this same domain space as the EAC, this would be a violation of government regulations on participating by a government official as an Advisor in an organization whose work is a direct benefit, consequence of, or impacted by the regulatory agency for which the individual is employed.  That's basic Administrative law.  Exceptions can be made, but I doubt it here.  During the time Mr. Newby was in employed in Johnson County, KS as its Election Chief, that may have been the case, but not after he joined the U.S. EAC.

We have enjoyed Brian's association for many years as a pioneer of this effort.  Maybe you should speak with him and see if you can get him to resign.  We have endured all sorts of Black-op folks attempts to dis-assemble CAVO-  and we will endure yours.. 

I have no time or interest in dissolving CAVO.  My father taught me long ago, "Never try to shoot a man attempting suicide."  

I have no need or desire to convince Brian to do anything.  An "association" of the past is one thing.  Your words are measured. 

1.	By "effort" do you mean CAVO, Yes or No?  
2.	By "resign" do you mean removing himself from some official affiliation with CAVO, Yes or No?  
3.	And are you trying to tell me that a paid employee of the U.S. EAC, namely Brian Newby, is on your Board or an active member of your organization, Yes or No ?  

I presume you realize that materially misrepresenting a claim of involvement of a Federal paid government official in your organization as an official member where the conflict of interest is patent, would be a serious issue with legal recourse, right? So, do you stand by that claim, Brent, or would you like to clarify this for the record? 

7. The OSET Foundation is not "peddling" anything; we're a nonprofit research institute backed by philanthropists and Foundations.  Our history in open source is deep; its roots are in the Mozilla Foundation and Netscape, including licensing counsel. The OSS world is a broad and diverse community.  It is incorrect to suggest that one's standing in the OSS world is predicated on which groups, sub-groups or sections of that community they participate or "reach out" to engage.  That would be like suggesting that if you're from NY and you do not consort with those from CA, then you're not American.   And we welcome scrutiny.

i am providing that scrutiny per the direction of the OSI community.  You fail. 

But failed at what< Brent?  What?

You may be providing that scrutiny for some faction or portion of the OSI "community" Brent but who cares?  The OSS community is larger than OSI; that's a reality check.  OSI is highly relevant, but you personally and your behavior are increasingly irrelevant.  Read the license text.  Read what your own cited "authority" for OSS licensing said about his voting for accreditation of the OPL.  R.E.A.D it.  

To what extent the "community" believes in the credibility or strength of the OPL I cannot worry about at the moment.  We are committed to convincing election procurement officials that there is NO excuse or legal reason they canNOT accept OSS as part of a system.  We have no need to convince the OSI of anything further.  

The license argument with county procurement officers has been rendered moot wth them by offering the OPL as an alternative to GPL so to eliminate the six typical legal arguments raised in pecuniary transactions.  

I thought you are a lawyer; if you are then surely you can understand this.  And then you would understand that we're all working for the same result from different angles.

8. I don't believe anyone here considers this industry to offer a "money grab" opportunity.  Election products and services is a stagnant industry with a dysfunctional market.  As the forthcoming Wharton Industry Study will show it is at best a $300M annual market in the U.S., a backwater of government I.T. hardly worthy of any characterization as a growth opportunity.

Correct-- Minor money grab--  max power grab--  Billionaires don't need more money-- they crave more power-  next-  

Again, regarding the election technology market, this is nonsensical conspiracy theory tin-foil hat wearing garbage.  There is no power to garner so long as there is a federal certification process and regulatory schemes to protect against such behaviors.  And the market isn't worth it.  Investments made in the commercial sector by Allen, SAP, or others are for a global market of services largely unavailable and illegal by election law in the U.S.

9. The OSET OPL license (designed for those counties procuring a system that has contained in that purchase an OSS license), required only one (1) change in order to be approved by the OSI -- a change that made sense and which was done. So, I'm not sure whose eyebrows are being raised by what.  The OPL is an open source license as determined by the OSI, and I believe it deserves to be acknowledged as such, and not ridiculed by innuendo or claims unsubstantiated by the facts.  It was approved.  It may not be one preferred by some, but the license is not meant for everyone.  It offers nothing less than the GPL in terms of an open source, weak copyleft license and offers some terms that help adoption in those jurisdictions who would otherwise use the GPL as a legal excuse to not adopt.  And in any event, the terms of the OPL allow any licensee who is "not in the ordinary course of commercial business to deliver elections systems or services" to accept the source code under the GPL.  We encourage people to read the license information, it is all explained there.  http://www.osetfoundation.org/public-license  

If we weren't on duty to clip your wings.. you may have gotten away with OSI approving your scheme.. and Heather Meeks would rule the day. 

Heather Meeker is her name. Clipping wings?  The license WAS approved. There was one minor change we agreed to make that had to be made anyway.

Did it ever dawn on you that we did not need OSI accreditation, but as part of cooperating with the OSS community we WANTED TO DO SO?  The OPL is an open source license as defined by the OSI, word for word and would withstand any legal challenge to such.  Facts, Brent. Facts.

Fortunately-- we were made aware and responded.  You lost.  

Lost?  Lost what?  You are truly off your rocker, I mean possibly clinically.  The license modification was a correction to a nuanced situation.  We negotiated an agreement to make the license fully acceptable.  That element was minor and something we needed to do anyway.  We appreciated legal counsel pointing it out.  We lost nothing;  Nobody lost anything.  An additional specialized OSS license was approved to help end an issue in county procurement.

By the way: we have several letters from Election Directors who expressed their need for this kind of legal resolution and license.  It was those letters and our willingness to deliver them that, as I understand it from Counsel, in part helped the OSI committee reach their conclusion.

Now your license is in conformity but your background is not.  

I have no idea what you are talking about, but then this is about the point where I move on to more productive stuff.  

There was NEVER a "conformity" issue.  There was a question about whether the terms we added were necessary.  And I have no idea what you mean about my background?  But then like Donald Trump, all you can do is personalize everything and make it ad-hominem.

As an analogy, some people are obviously disqualified from being privy to the nuclear codes, no matter how spiffy their suit or presentation. You sir, are no protector of democracy, but rather an opportunist to be protected against.   

You know nothing about me, my journey, my family or anything you dolt.  You are telling ME what I am and am not? Seriously?

*	Born of German immigrants who were holocaust survivors and made it into this country and became full citizens.
*	A brother served in the US Military; USS Coral Sea flying F4s as part of the Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club; shot down POW/MIA for 4 years.
*	My father was a civilian military engineer working on aircraft carrier hydraulics; a die-hard patriot.
*	My mother was a cryptographer working for the US Naval Intelligence
*	Both of my parents have long since passed away as have my sister and my brother.
*	This project is my way of serving and giving back to my country.
*	And I have NOT been paid a single dollar in compensation in 9 years of working on it.

DO NOT TELL ME WHAT I AM OR NOT.  You know nothing of me. Nothing.

The license was only developed to ensure certain perceived barriers to adoption could be removed in the purchase of voting systems that one day might contain OSS.  We have been, and continue to be perplexed as to why this non-issue remains an issue for some.

 " Perceived barriers '  being the catch phrase-    You purport to have a secret list of government procurement people demanding your nouveau licence..  but that is a lie. 

There is no secret list. And it is not a lie.

Again, we offered letters from Election Officials in support of this work.  The Stakeholder Community, 200 of them in our mail list contain dozens who for political ideological reasons or business reasons wish to remain anonymous.  We asked the list as a whole, and because some were concerned about political or vendor pressure, they requested we maintain its anonymity until the day there is a federal certification for a voting system of this work we're doing.  On that day the list will be disclosed.  

It was a small agreement to make for the benefit downstream it will one day offer.  That "benefit" being: showing the elections community that we built something of, by, and for the people, guided by those who determine what they will use to administer elections.  And that it was not just some Silicon Valley idea of what should be made.

The barriers are "perceived" indeed, by those in procurement.  Some of them are real if they attempt to conflate contract law with licensing law.  A real lawyer would understand this fundamental legal principle that differentiates a contract from a license.

And they (no one in fact) ever "demanded" anything.  We offered them a solution to their objections (some six reasons they raised) why the GPL was insufficient.  We built a solution to remove those objections.  They did not demand it.  They only pointed out that for the reasons now we;; stated, they could not accept the GPL without requiring modifications to it as part of any contract to purchase any system from any vendor who might incorporate open source software subject to a weak copyleft license.  You could read that in our rationale document, but you won't because that would change your reality that you have concocted.

I think everyone is getting the gist of this now. It is Davey vs Goliath.  The little general public vs the Billionaires seeking control. i do not enjoy doing this defensive task , but I must stand up for the dignity of the real scientific community that should not be soiled as they do the real work. 

This is the most laughable part of your entire missive and I appreciate you at least offering me a chance to reduce some cortisol discharge.  The OSS community is large and diverse, Brent, and as I noted elsewhere this comment is a lot like saying that those from Colorado are not doing real work because they are not from Alabama.

The GPL is a fine and sound license that has a very important if not vital role in the OSS world.  So much so, that the OPL license cites the GPL as the alternative if none of the terms of the OPL apply to the licensee's intended use.  NO Davey and Goliath.  In fact if that were the case, it would be the other way around:  the OPL is a highly specialized niche license that is a minor footnote in the world of OSS licensing; where GPL is the Goliath.

Billionaires are not seeking control.  They are interested in making high impact social investments that are donations; legal gifts for income tax purposes to affect some social good.  In fact, by virtue of their grants and gifts under IRS law they canNOT have ANY control in how the money is used only that it is used for the purpose of the mission of the receiving organization, who in turn, cannot use it for anything other than its nonprofit purpose.  And it all must be clearly documented.

There is no indignation here Brent.  We have over 48 OSS volunteers and paid staff working. We receive 3-5 new volunteer applications per week.  Stand up for whatever dignity issue you think exists.

I predict we shall overcome. Thanks for your patience 

I'm actually struggling to be patient with your ignorance, bull-headedness and Trump-ish behavior.  Enjoy your crusade for whatever you think you are crusading for. "Make voting great again," or "OSS First," or whatever you believe your charge is. 

We're going to continue on our mission for higher integrity, lower cost, and easier to use verifiable, evidenced-based elections as well.  The irony is, the missions are actually toward the same end.  its just two very different ways of approaching it.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.opensource.org/pipermail/cavo_lists.opensource.org/attachments/20160731/ae9f2150/attachment.html>